Somebody in my inner circle approached me about writing and promoting a book, and I recommended WG2E as a resource.

Well, I was flattered and intrigued when D.D. recently wrote me, inviting me to be a regular contributor to WG2E.

I’m very careful about committing to anything…my word if my bond. My family kids me about that…I won’t commit to picking up apples on the way home, verbally, unless I would sacrifice a great deal to accomplish it. I tend to say things like, “Sure, I’ll try to do that.” 🙂

I don’t think this will overly burden me, though. We’ve agreed that what I give D.D. for WG2E will be a non-exclusive license…that means I could use it here, if I find it would otherwise interfere with what I do here.

I’m going to be writing those pieces for writers, and while I do address writers here from time to time, that is a different market. My guess is, though, that you wouldn’t mind that. 🙂 Feel free to let me know if you think you would.

As regular readers know, that article title shows that D.D. and I don’t agree on everything stylistically. 🙂 Yes, apparently D.D. is what I call a “serial punc”…someone who uses multiple punctuation marks at the end of a sentence, like !!! or ??? However, I’m smart enough to know that’s just a pet peeve of mine…even though it makes me tweak, I can get myself not to judge people based on that.

My pieces will appear on the second Saturday of the month (starting this month, so December 10) and I’ll be able to submit them ahead of time. We’re looking at 500 to 1,000 words, typically. I made myself a commitment to average 1,000 words a day in this post, and I do that easily. I kidded with my Significant Other on that…I jokingly said that I can yawn 500 words. 😉

D.D. wanted a picture, and as you know, I don’t usually do that. I did create an image, though…

It’s a picture I took with my Samsung Captivate in my library, and then I ran it through an app called Paper Camera to give it a cooler effect.

I was going to post the image here, and then it hit me that the cover I’m using on the Fire is probably under copyright protection, so I need to ask for permission first. If I get it, I’ll add the image here.

I actually don’t recommend that collection for people who just want to read the Oz books, because it contains an Oz rarity that has a lot of ethnic humor, including the use of the “n word”. I understand wanting to include it for completeness, but for kids reading through the series, I think it’s jarringly out of place compared to the so-called “Famous Fourteen” original Oz books.

i got the Complete Wizard of Oz early on when I first got my Kindle, hoping to revisit a childhood favorite, but couldn’t get through the second book for all the outdated attitudes that I found really offensive.l

It’s The Woggle-Bug Book, which isn’t commonly considered part of the series (it’s not part of the Famous Fourteen).

Baum did a lot with theatre (a major element of the 1939 Judy Garland movie comes from one of the stage plays, not from the book), and this book is an adaptation of a play that Baum did. It doesn’t fit in well with the series…for one thing, it largely takes place in our world, with Professor Woggle-Bug visiting here. It’s full of ethnic humor, and is even arguably a bit risque.

I’ve written about that issue of judging books by the standards of their original time…what did you find offensive in The Marvelous Land of Oz?

Maybe it wasn’t the second book I choked on… which is the one with General Ginjur and her all-girl army? the sexism and stereotypical “this is what happens when girls are in charge” stuff really offended me.

That’s one where it helps to know the background. Baum was an active supporter of the right of women voting in the USA. That issue was heating up at the time, although it was still more than a decade away before the right was granted. The Marvelous Land of Oz has elements of parody, however, General Jinjur is not a fool. As the series progresses, the gender politics are fascinating. Oz is ruled by women, and the power tends to reside with them as well. Ozma, Glinda, and Dorothy have more impact on governing and guiding Oz than any of the males do.

While Baum was clearly writing General Jinjur’s army with an eye for the stage and what would sell there, it’s easy to miss the parody today.

It’s funny, because I find that sexism in older books is more likely to pull me up short than, say, racism. It’s not because I find sexism more intolerable, but because, I think, it was the larger major civil rights issue in my time. It feels more personally offensive. So, I try to recognize that, and judge the book by the standards of the time…is the work beyond the norm for the time in its portrayals?

In the Oz books, I honestly think Baum was giving more credit to women than was typically given at the time…not less. He did disguise it in humor and parody, in a way. That’s always been an advantage that science fiction and fantasy has had in the ability to show things outside the norm. Yes, 1950s women scientists in science fiction movies would scream and faint…but hey, they were actually shown as legitimate scientists. You weren’t seeing that much in mainstream dramas…